


Aches and Pains

by sharkduck



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types, Assassin's Creed Valhalla
Genre: Assassin's Creed Valhalla spoilers, F/M, Hytham has straight panic, I said adhd Eivor rights and you can't do anything about it, Mentally Ill Eivor, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Repressed Feelings, Unrequited Feelings That Turn Into Requited Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-15
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-10 07:29:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27579848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sharkduck/pseuds/sharkduck
Summary: Hytham is used to leaving things behind - people, places, keepsakes - and so he puts little faith in attachment. But occasionally he finds places in the world, spots beautiful enough that he'll carry them with him when he goes. Today he takes his good friend Eivor, whom he definitely does not have feelings for, to one of those spots for pleasant conversation.The conversation is not pleasant.
Relationships: Eivor/Hytham (Assassin's Creed)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 112





	1. I Know a Spot

As much as Hytham hates the cold, he does love this land of Norway; the way that the fjords form gaping, black-toothed maws, teeth and fangs made of rock and salt jutting out of the sea. He loves snow, when it’s clean and fresh-fallen. Not the muddy muck trampled by hooves and boots that one finds in cities, the kind of snow he finds on mountains, bigger than any he has ever seen. Powdery, glittering white. That is when he loves snow the best, because that is when he can watch the ground catch colors as the sun sets. Powdery pink and purple and burning orange.

He misses warmth, yes, and maybe he even misses sand, but this? The way the sky paints the ground? When he leaves it will leave a hollow ache in his chest, like a longing for someone he may never meet again.

There is someone who will leave the same feeling, he thinks. Hytham glances over his shoulder at her as she trudges up the mountain after him, following his footpaths.  He has come to consider Eivor a friend, and more than once he’s thought of what life will be like when he leaves her behind. The ache in his chest at the thought is the sadness of losing a confidante, someone who could make him laugh. _Friendship._ That is the name he calls it, because he refuses to give it any other.

He had invited her up the mountain because he wanted to share the view with her. He comes up here sometimes, and he’s found himself fondly referring to it as  _ his spot. _ He wanted to share _his_ _spot_ with his friend, because _his spot_ is a nice thing and nice things should be shared between friends. That is all, he tells himself, and no more than that.

“So,” Hytham flops against the ground, spread out with his arms behind his head as Eivor sits next to him, silhouetted by a red, sinking sun. He regrets it - he can feel frigid snow creeping into the gaps in his clothing. His nose stings, probably bright red. “Now that Kjotve the Cruel is no more, what will you do now?”

Eivor says nothing - only stares ahead at the sun dipping ever-lower beneath the sea. He does not like the silence.

“I don’t know,” she says, finally, after a long pause that sent Hytham spiraling into an anxious tumble of  _ did I say the wrong thing?  _

It appears he has. Foot, meet mouth.

“What do you mean? You’ve had your vengeance. What else do you desire out of life?” A small shrug. Eivor’s eyes are distant, following the path of the dying sun, looking at some far-off point that Hytham cannot see. It worries him, that stare. He has seen it on far too many drink-addled veterans of the brotherhood, the ones who have let their ghosts scratch and claw at their minds.

“A good death, I think.” Hytham sits up.

_ “Eivor.” _

“What? I can think of nothing else I want,” Eivor turns her gaze to her hands, picking at calluses and scars. He has never seen her so…  _ quiet.  _ She has always been loud. Obnoxious, even, at times. Never given to sullenness, not like now. “You are right -- Kjotve the Cruel’s bones feed the earth. Seventeen winters I have chased him; I know nothing else. I have nothing else.”

“There must be  _ something,” _ Hytham does not know why he is so frantic. He also does not know why he suggests children, a family, but it makes Eivor laugh all the same. Not the laugh he likes, the one he’s used to, the one that rings and rings and rings, with the occasional snort that interrupts her. This laugh is sharp.  _ Bitter _ , even.

“Do I look like someone who could settle down with a family?” He does not know why his chest tightens. He feels himself deflate. Sunken shoulders mirroring the sun’s death arc. Thankfully Eivor does not notice, lost as she is in her own thoughts. “Besides; I would make a terrible mother to a child. I cannot stand still long enough to raise one.” He has never seen her so open, so he waits, patiently, letting her talk with those distant eyes. 

Her voice has dropped to the quietest murmur. “If I keep moving, my ghosts cannot haunt me.”

The silence that hangs between the two of them is oppressively heavy. He wants to do something -- reach out and touch her back, take her hand. Reassure her somehow.

But then she stands so fast he jumps back, instincts honed to a point, and she grins down at him.

“Let’s go fishing!”

“Fishing?”

“Fishing! I know of a spot near those rocks rich with fat fish. Down there. Do you see it?” He does not. He lies and says he does anyway. Nice things and spots, after all, should be shared with friends. “I will race you down!”

He does not let her win; she’s faster than him, always. 

He just hopes that, perhaps, she will slow down enough to look at him as she descends into the mouth of the fjord, even despite her ghosts.

She does not.


	2. Creatures of Kindness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There are nights when Eivor wakes up screaming, and nights when Hytham is kept awake with aches and pains. They find some solace in each other, and Hytham shares a little philosophy.

There are some nights when Eivor wakes screaming. This is one of those nights.

It is also one of those nights when Hytham is kept awake by the pain in his chest, ribcage feeling sticky against his skin. Every time he breathes there’s a new ache. Laying down only serves to make it worse.

So, he wanders, like a ghost in the night. He keeps a candle with him, of course, to ward off nightly vapors and foxes (which, honestly, are more a threat to him than the vapors are) and his boots are sturdy to deter snakes. Up and down the hill he wanders. First to the river, then up, then back again. The road is tamped down by his restless feet.

Ravensthorpe is a nothing encampment - a few scattered tents, a forge, and a bureau do not a town make, but Hytham is content to call it home for now. While he can, at least. There will come a day when his work finishes, and he must move on.

He hates it. He never has before, but he does now.

He has just passed the longhouse for the third time tonight when he hears a scream. The scream.  _ Eivor’s  _ scream.

It’s amazing, really, how the mind forces the aches down when it jumps into action. Hytham’s eyes zero in on the longhouse door. Closed and locked. But there are windows. His feet move faster than they should and he clears the sill in one hop, and not even his candle blows out. He feels a little ridiculous when he skids into Eivor’s room, no weapon but a candle-holder. At least he has the dignity of wearing pants.

Eivor stares at him with owlish eyes.

He is an  _ idiot. _

“Did something happen?” Hytham brandishes his candle-holder sheepishly, and he knows the answer to his question before it even comes. He knows nightmares. They have shared his bed more nights than not.

Eivor shakes her head and runs a hand over her tangled hair.

“No. No, nothing,” she says, but he can see the roll of her eyes, the frantic way she casts about the room. Trying to chase away ghosts.

He softens and cautiously sits at the edge of her mattress, giving her space, his back to her as a show of trust. The adrenaline leaves his body all at once and his chest aches so hard he coughs, quietly, trying to play it off. If Eivor notices she says nothing.

“Do you always sleep with your boots on?” She asks him, and he snorts.

“No. I couldn’t sleep.”

“Bad dreams?” He hums.

“No. The soreness keeps me awake.” She nods, sympathetic. “What of you? I assume you weren’t screaming in order to practice your war cry.”

Eivor says nothing to that too.

Hytham opens his mouth to speak, a smile trying to force its way through. Eivor stops him with a raised hand, and she still won’t look at him. He wishes, more than anything, that she would.

“Stop,” she says, spits almost, and Hytham can’t help but feel that she is not so much angry at him as she is herself. “I know what you are going to say, and you are wrong to presume there is no shame in these visions.” He turns his head and stares at a spot on the wall, placing his candle on the floor nearby.

“We are creatures of kindness, Wolf-Kissed,” he says. “Why else would we be so inclined to acts of generosity, or to seek companionship?” He didn’t mean to say that aloud, but Eivor is looking at him, at least. He keeps going, hoping to keep her mind busy enough that she might sleep peacefully. “Why else would we make laws? They are there to remind us that our virtues - kindness, generosity, honor - are universal. We care for our dead and our elderly and those who cannot fend for themselves. I know of no other creature who does these things, who would write into their burrows and caves that one must be noble with its kin.” He smiles and looks at her again, trying to be reassuring.

“Your dreams and these ghosts that haunt you - they remind you of your humanity. Of your kindness.”

“Moreso my guilt.”

“To feel guilt is to feel human, Eivor, and it is your guilt that feeds your kindness. You have a good heart, better than any other person I have ever met. And it has been bruised by blows beyond your control. You could not have done any more than you already have.” Eivor brings her knees up to her chest and stares at the furs in her lap, and Hytham takes that as his cue to exit. He has done all he can.

He leans down to pick his candle from the floor and stands, pain erupting out of his ribs. He is good at hiding it now. He does not even flinch.

He makes for the door.

“Hytham?” He looks back over his shoulder. Eivor is picking at the calluses on her palms. “Stay with me?” His mouth goes dry in an instant, and he coughs into his hand.

_ She needs this,  _ he thinks.  _ I will stay with her until she falls asleep, and then I will go. _ He tells himself that in the hopes that he can see it through. He promises himself that as soon as he hears her snoring, he will leave. He smiles, shaky, and blows the candle out to shroud the two of them in darkness, and then he makes his way over to the bed. Silent like a wood mouse, as Eivor likes to say.

The furs are soft, smelling of yarrow and lavender and lye.

He lets Eivor lay her head on his chest and listen to the harsh, whistling sound of his breathing, and the rapid-fire of his heartbeat that he tries desperately to slow.

It’s an agonizing process before he manages to find the courage to wrap an arm around her shoulders, a steady hand on the trunk of her arm. There’s a scar there, small and thin, and Hytham busies himself by tracing it with his thumb in the hopes that it will distract him from the weight of her body against his side. Her hair smells of woodsmoke.

Eventually, she manages to sleep.

Hytham does not keep to his promises. He does not leave. Instead he stays awake and watches her in the sliver of light from the moon.

He tries to tell himself the ache in his chest is his wound.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know this was tagged as a drabble but now it's my dedicated place for shorts while i playthrough the main storyline. i am so sorry


End file.
